If you consign, pack, load or receive goods as part of your
business, you could be held liable for breaches of road transport
laws - even if you had no direct role in driving or operating a
heavy vehicle - according to the newly commenced Heavy Vehicle
National Law (HVNL).

Under the HVNL's chain of responsibility (CoR)
provisions, if you exercise (or could exercise) control or
influence over any transport-related task, you are captured by the
laws and have a responsibility to ensure that the road transport
laws are not breached. In this way, the CoR provisions are similar
to the legal concept of 'duty of care' that underpins work health
and safety law.

Specifically, the HVNL introduces the concept of a 'responsible
person' - making the laws applicable to a wider category of people
connected with the road transport industry than ever before. Each
person in the supply chain has a general duty to take all
reasonable steps to ensure a heavy vehicle driver can perform their
duties without breaching road transport laws. The legislation also
prescribes specific responsibilities for drivers,
loaders/packers/loading managers, operators/managers/schedulers and
consignor/consignees. Importantly, a person may have more than one
duty by virtue of being in the supply chain in more than one
way.

The model laws

For businesses that operate across multiple jurisdictions, the
harmonised laws mean that you will no longer be required to
navigate the rules and comply with the sometimes inconsistent
requirements of each jurisdiction (with the exception of Western
Australia, which has so far refused to adopt the new laws). Please
note that the laws have not yet commenced in the Northern Territory
and the Australian Capital Territory, but are expected to do so in
the near future.

The HVNL is one set of laws for heavy vehicles (over 4.5 tonnes)
that cover, among other things, vehicle accreditation, load
restraints, driver fatigue management and speed limit management.
The HVNL also introduces a new national driver work diary and a
single structure for fees for access permits, and expressly
prohibits people in the supply chain from making terms of
consignment or work/employment contracts that will result in,
encourage, reward or provide an incentive for a driver or other
party in the supply chain to break any road transport laws.

It is important to note that the HVNL does not affect laws
relating to heavy vehicle registration, inspections, driver
licensing and all matters related to the carriage of dangerous
goods - these will remain the responsibility of state and territory
authorities.

For all businesses that have permits in force, it is important
to note that these permits will continue to have effect as if they
were made under the HVNL and will remain current for the same
routes and with the same conditions until their expiry or
replacement under the national access framework (whichever comes
first). New permit applications will need to be made through the
National Heavy Vehicle Regulator (Regulator).

Offences

There are around 330 offences under the laws. The HVNL
recognises that not all offences have the same impact on safety or
infrastructure and accordingly some offences have been scaled
according to their road safety risk. That is, offences regarding
fatigue management, mass, dimension and loading and speed
compliance will fall within classes ranging from minor to critical,
with critical breaches attracting the largest penalties.

For some (though not all) offences, the HVNL makes available a
'reasonable steps' defence for persons in the supply chain if they
can show they did not know or could not reasonably have been
expected to know that a breach had occurred. In making out this
defence, a person will also have to prove they took all (and not
just some) reasonable steps to prevent the breach or there were no
reasonable steps they could have taken to prevent the breach. In
reality, this defence may be difficult to establish.

State and territory police and authorised officers will continue
to enforce heavy vehicle offences under the HVNL.

Practical considerations

The HVNL is now fully operational in almost all states and
compliance is mandatory. Any employer or contractor that is
involved in road transport or uses road transport services is
likely to be considered part of the CoR with obligations under the
new legislation.

Businesses should:

assess whether they are part of the road transport CoR
(as well as which people within their organisation have
specific responsibilities);

assess their responsibilities under the legislation (by
identifying and assessing aspects of the activities which the
business supervises that could lead to an offence); and

undertake the appropriate steps toward compliance.

These steps will likely include (among other things) ensuring
that equipment and work systems are maintained, implementing and
documenting policies, procedures and workplace practices, and
ensuring that staff are adequately trained in such policies,
procedures and workplace practices. We recommend that businesses
also include compliance and assurance terms in relevant commercial
arrangements with other responsible persons